


Love is a Damn Good Story

by Cuda (Scylla)



Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Supernatural, Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Children of Earth Compliant, Don't copy to another site, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, Harkstiel, Heartache, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Past Relationship(s), SuperWood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 15:48:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19444597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scylla/pseuds/Cuda
Summary: Just a few months after the 456 leave Earth with indelible scars, Castiel answers an unexpected call from Detroit. He's not in the mood for more human suffering, but quickly discovers that he's more needed than he guessed.





	Love is a Damn Good Story

**Author's Note:**

> Quick warning - Ianto's canonical death is referenced, which may be upsetting to some readers. If you need to duck out now, you have my love and understanding.

When Castiel heard Jack's call, he was in no mood for sympathy. Fully intending to give Jack a piece of his mind when he arrived, Castiel let the quiet pull guide him. Destinations were always a little fuzzy on these kinds of calls, so he was surprised to land on a gritty street corner in downtown Detroit. For a Saturday night, the sidewalks were deserted. A fine rain glossed the street.  
  
Jack sat on the curb, in the most un-Jack-like pose Castiel had ever seen. Bent over his knees, Jack clasped his hands behind his head like a child in a tornado drill. He looked small; crumpled up somehow.  
  
He was soaked. The greatcoat so much his signature that it seemed a part of Jack was absent.  
  
In any other mood, Castiel might have worried.  
  
Tonight, he had absolutely no use for Jack, whatsoever. One more hyper-emotional human, drenching him in their hormones, having another breakdown, ruining his day.  
  
Ruining his life.  
  
Castiel cast his glare at the sky and heaved a defeated breath. "What do you need, Jack?" Castiel snapped, "Why are we out here? Where's your coat?"  
  
Jack laughed in soft, wet bursts. He raised his head, and Castiel saw the coat bundled in his arms, clamped between Jack's chest and his thighs as if it could give him heat that way. "Good old Castiel," Jack said, voice congested, "My guardian angel."  
  
Castiel tipped his head. "You're not my charge." He squinted at Jack, and at their surroundings. The curb was in front of a pub, a neon pegasus in flight above the door. By its glow, Castiel could see the flush on his cheeks; his sluggish, wavering gaze. He'd seen it enough to know the signs, and his irritation drained away under a bucket of icewater fear.  
  
"You're drunk. You're never drunk."  
  
Jack raised his index finger. "Score one for Hot Wings."  
  
"Why are you drunk?"  
  
"I was drinking," Jack pronounced every word with overdone care, "obviously."  
  
Castiel sidled towards him, aware of his own awkwardness and hating it. He reached down to Jack. "You drove here?"  
  
When his hands brushed the coat, Jack jerked it out of his reach. "Yes."  
  
"How long have you been here?" Castiel reached for his elbow, then, trying not to touch the coat.  
  
Together, they wrestled Jack to his feet. "I don't know."  
  
"You always know," Castiel insisted. Which was apparently the wrong thing to say.  
  
Jack tore himself loose again and staggered back. "Yeah? Well today I don't." He leaned into the emphasis, which tilted him into a pothole full of ankle-deep water. He looked down, then up at at Castiel again, shadows and harsh neon lights carving his face in sharp points. "Today I don't know anything. I've spent too much time being the know-it-all. Always prepared, that's me. That's Captain Jack Harkness. And what good did it do?"  
  
Castiel waited, squinting at Jack through the rain. Did he want an answer, or a witness? He'd known Jack a little, but not long enough. Not like the other humans in his life, whose years of predictable behavior patterns had worn two grooves in Castiel's brain by now - one for each.  
  
"I don't know," Castiel said, "but can we please return to your vehicle? You're soaked." And I'm soaked, he thought, and miracles don't quite come as cheap as they used to.  
  
"Because I'll catch my death?" Jack mocked.  
  
"Because something is wrong," Castiel replied, "and if you're going to be hysterical, I'd rather you do it in some relative safety. For me, if you're not interested."  
  
They watched one another, tense, tango dancers at the start of a familiar tune. Castiel extended a hand; saw Jack's expression shut on him like a door.  
  
He pivoted, offered an arm instead. Not a tango, but perhaps a waltz.  
  
"I did come, Jack," Castiel reminded him, looking away.  
  
After a pause so long that Castiel expected to turn and find him gone, Jack slid his hand into the bend of Castiel's elbow.  
  
"Three blocks west," he said.  
  
Castiel stared at him, then slowly let his eyes slide to the vast lengths of empty parking to either side of the street.  
  
"So I'd sober up on the way," was Jack's defense.  
  
"You are never this stupid," Castiel said, almost fondly. No, not almost.  
  
"I am when I feel like it," Jack replied. Together, they walked the rainy street, three blocks west to a tiny, blue hatchback. Old enough by automobile industry standards to be called a hatchback, with the boxy lines of an Eighties sports car and the black louvres on the rear window like gills on some sort of undersea beast. His shock at Jack's choice of conveyance must have made itself obvious, as Jack poked a key (an actual key) in the passenger door.  
  
"Figured it was time for a change," Jack said, as he swung the door open and gestured Castiel inside.  
  
Castiel stood fast. "I'll drive," he said.  
  
And thankfully, that was all it took. Jack conceded with a surprised 'huh,' ducking into the low vehicle to unlock the driver's side door. He handed Castiel the keys. "I didn't know you could drive," he said.  
  
Castiel started the car and peered down at the center console. "I didn't know you could drive a stick shift."  
  
"I can drive anything," Jack proclaimed, then slumped back with his hand over his eyes as if the statement was the needle in the proverbial balloon.  
  
The little blue hatchback pulled away from the curb and into downtown Detroit's scattered traffic. Jack didn't volunteer directions, and Castiel - with considerable effort - didn't ask. He'd never been alone in Detroit. Given its looming status in the Winchesters' mythology, he was curious to explore. Rain kissed the streetlights and polished the asphalt until it shone, painting the city a riot of hazy colors. Away from the street where he'd found Jack, the traffic picked up. They rolled past storefronts, glowing with life or boarded over in turn. It was like any other city, prosperity and poverty slamming into one another in a ragged patchwork, sewn with wet streets.  
  
"Are you alone?" Castiel asked, as office buildings drifted into suburbs.  
  
Jack's head was back against the headrest, eyes closed. The question registered no reaction.  
  
"Is there a case?" Castiel prodded.  
  
Eyes still closed, Jack's head lolled slowly side to side. "I'm sure there's plenty, if you want a chase," he said, "city this size, lots of empty buildings, not enough police to manage it all. It's a little cold for the things that staked a claim in Cardiff. Could be interesting."  
  
Castiel gave it some thought. "I want to hit things," he admitted ruefully, "which you frown on."  
  
"Most people are just trying to live their lives," Jack replied, a shrug in his voice, "and you've got a unique talent for not seeing nuances. Find me someone profiteering on alien technology, and I'll find you something to hit."  
  
They spent a few more minutes in silence, taking streets at random. Jack suggested a turn, offered a decision when they came to a choice between left or right. They passed churches and gas stations, and the occasional abandoned strip mall. The patches of prosperity grew smaller and smaller. "You don't do social calls," Castiel observed, finally turning the car back towards the metro area, "Either you have a reason for calling, or I'm hallucinating."  
  
Jack didn't laugh. "Maybe you are."  
  
It began to rain in earnest. With a sigh, Castiel flicked on the windshield wipers. "I suppose I could use a break. But if you're wasting my time—"  
  
"You wanted it to be a crisis?" Jack asked.  
  
"I want you to be honest," Castiel snapped.  
  
Again, road noise filled the empty gap of silence as Jack didn't respond. Castiel considered a dozen things to do, up to and including dumping Jack at a bus stop and stealing his car. Before he could commit to any action, Jack let out a sigh. "Not my style," he said, "but take me back to the hotel for a nightcap, and I can tell you a damn good story."  
  
-  
  
The damn good story didn't find its way into the open until almost dawn. Castiel lay mostly on Jack's chest, startled at his own rapid acceptance of the situation. Sex wasn't something they'd done before. Jack flirted with him, but Jack flirted with everybody. Castiel enjoyed it as a friendly gesture.  
  
Flirtation certainly hadn't been anywhere in the vicinity of tonight, but Castiel noticed when Jack's hands lingered; when he stopped moving away from Castiel's offered touches in return. Castiel felt the sadness in him, stark now without the distraction of the traffic. He offered comfort in the only language he believed Jack could still hear, and Jack took it with a mix of hesitation and hunger.  
  
Castiel didn't quite know an orgasm could be so much. Didn't quite expect the surge of emotion in the mental emptiness that followed. He clung to Jack, and Jack to him.  
  
Neither of them slept.  
  
"So, the story starts with a man," Jack said, the vibration of his voice stirring Castiel out of his own thoughts, "a good man; a complicated one. The people around him didn't pay much attention to him when he showed up, and he wanted it that way. He convinced them all to trust him - or at least ignore him - because he needed to fly under the radar. He was trying to rescue someone he loved. You know, one way or another, he was always trying to rescue someone he loved."  
  
"And did he?" Castiel asked, after Jack's thoughtful pause stretched into minutes. Jack's airless chuckle moved his chest beneath Castiel's cheek.  
  
"Most of the time, not really," Jack said, in a voice tinged with nostalgia and regret, "but that was the beauty of the guy - he never stopped trying to save people. Just a few people. His family and his team, and whoever else he got attached to, right up until the very end. But he did. He tried. Over and over again, running into the burning buildings when everyone else ran away. Standing up to the nightmares with his give 'em hell attitude and his sarcasm. You'd like - you'd have liked him."  
  
A question lingered in the air, as Castiel considered the past tense laid over Jack's story. A tension built too, until he hesitated to ask. There was a 'very end' to this man's story, and there could be only one possible finality. Jack's words were warm now, turning over the loving details with a tender smile in his voice, and Castiel didn't want the responsibility to remind him. He stroked Jack's ribs, drinking in the new sensation of fingers along his back and a heartbeat under his ear, and let him remember in his own time.  
  
"It was bound to happen - one day he'd go up against something he couldn't handle. And he did it because he was angry, for the sake of people he loved, like always. He died for it," Jack finished.  
  
"How long ago?" Castiel said.  
  
"Four months."  
  
It only took a moment to reckon up the math, but the dates were more affirmation than revelation. Castiel suspected the underpinnings of the story since the beginning. He only had a little to go on - Jack had only been his friend a few decades - but the fate of the man in his story went around the world, as the news tore the veil of Earth's safe illusions away. The unknown man who'd gone to his death at Jack's side, against the space monsters in their box of poison gas.  
  
He knew what people said to the survivors of dead soldiers. He'd heard them. Sometimes he said them himself. But even with Castiel's limited expertise, he surmised the things that comforted other humans would do little for Captain Jack Harkness.  
  
So he said nothing.  
  
"He followed me in there," Jack said, "I should have stopped him. I shouldn't have let him go."  
  
"Could you have stopped him?" Castiel asked.  
  
"Of course I could have. He'd have been angry with me for it, but he'd be alive."  
  
Again, Castiel considered comfort. He blamed himself for plenty of his siblings' deaths, after all - he wouldn't wish that sort of pain on anyone. Jack hadn't pulled away from him, but his arm was a tense, still band around Castiel's back. The things he felt were his own to keep, but even the jagged edges that touched Castiel's perceptions carried overtones of guilt, and a hold on the pain like the teeth of a steel trap. All things considered, comfort would - at best - be unwelcome.  
  
"Why did you call me?" Castiel asked again, gentler now, "I don't want to disappoint you. There are limits to the miracles I can—"  
  
"Not that," Jack interrupted, "I've seen that."  
  
"Oh," Castiel replied. Rejection hurt, and he hated that it hurt. The sting finally motivated him to sit up, and he took the opportunity to reach for his clothing. Jack let him go, but Castiel could feel his eyes as he worked the buttons on his shirt.  
  
On the white covers, Jack's hands spread wide, smoothing out the creases. "I don't know. Would it hurt you to be a distraction? If I called you because I wanted to talk to someone who didn't know him? I was drunk. People make stupid decisions when they're drunk. Like calling their exes. It's a thing."  
  
"I'm not your ex," Castiel replied, exasperated. Across the bed, Jack growled in his chest.  
  
"If you want to leave, go," he said, "I shouldn't have called you. I just wanted to see if you'd come."  
  
You should have called me sooner, Castiel thought. You should have remembered. I could have helped. I could have done something. The words rushed up to his tongue, and he swallowed them. Lifted his chin and met Jack's eyes.  
  
"Did you get what you wanted?" he asked.  
  
Jack affected a smirk, and propped himself up on a bank of white hotel pillows. "Don't I always?"  
  
The urge swelled to punch out those perfect white teeth. Castiel stood perfectly still, riding the wave of his own rage, and watched Jack until the smile disappeared.  
  
"You know, you're kind of annoying, Castiel," Jack said.  
  
"But you did call," Castiel reminded him.  
  
"And why do you think I did that?"  
  
"I think the more relevant question is, why do _you_ think I answered?"  
  
They watched one another from across the empty country of white comforter. The space Castiel occupied was smooth now, straightened by Jack's restless hands.  
  
"I never asked you how you were," Jack said, soft. Almost sorry.  
  
"It's a long story," Castiel said, turning to go, "not a very good one."  
  
"You don't want to tell it?"  
  
"Not really," Castiel answered with a shrug, face still towards the door, "Are you going to be all right?"  
  
Another silence followed the question. Another long space of quiet, loud with unspoken things. Castiel shifted his weight, from the back foot to the front, and let his hand rest gently on the wall above the hotel room's universal light switch in the entryway. He waited, not quite looking over his shoulder.  
  
He heard Jack get up, slide out of the covers with the soft hiss of skin over cotton. He stood behind Castiel, not quite touching him. The warmth of him was radiant, bleeding through Castiel's dress shirt in the cool room. "I don't know, this time, Castiel," Jack said, "I promised him I wouldn't forget him. But time's going to take him. It always takes them."  
  
Castiel turned back. "I know," he said.  
  
"You try so hard to remember them, but time ruins memories. It strips off the color." Jack crossed his arms, chin on his chest. His left wrist was pale, the ever-present brown leather strap conspicuously missing. "One day he'll be a story I tell myself, and it'll feel like it happened to someone else. And I get angry."

Jack gulped a breath. "I hate this part."  
  
"But that's a long time off," Castiel said, gently. There might have been other, more comforting things to say, but none of them were true. "Mourn him, Jack. Miss him now."  
  
A smile creased the corners of Jack's mouth, followed by a wet hiccup of laughter. He unfolded one arm from his chest, reaching out without looking up. The cue was all Castiel needed. He let out a shivering breath of relief, and pulled Jack close.  
  
He didn't say it would be all right.  
  
It didn't need to be.

**Author's Note:**

> I found the beginning scraps of this story sitting in a folder a few nights ago, and decided to finish it. I've always been interested in how these two characters process grief and loss, both separately and together. What do you do when you're going to keep going on forever, cursed with a human brain that blurs and edits and forgets your memories? What if those are memories of someone you really don't want to forget?


End file.
